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Things of Middle-earth

King's Men

Then Tar-Ancalimon, son of Atanamir, became King...; and in his day the people of Númenor became divided. On the one hand was the greater party, and they were called the King's Men, and they grew proud and were estranged from the Eldar and the Valar. And on the other hand was the lesser party, and they were called the Elendili, the Elf-friends; for though they remained loyal indeed to the King and the House of Elros, they wished to keep the friendship of the Eldar, and they hearkened to the counsel of the Lords of the West....

Thus the bliss of Westernesse became diminished; but still its might and splendour increased. For the kings and their people had not yet abandoned wisdom, and if they loved the Valar no longer at least they still feared them. They did not dare openly to break the Ban... But the fear of death grew ever darker upon them, and they delayed it by all means that they could; and they began to build great houses for their dead, while their wise men laboured unceasingly to discover if they might the secret of recalling life, or at the least of the prolonging of Men's days. Yet they achieved only the art of preserving incorrupt the dead flesh of Men, and they filled all the land with silent tombs in which the thought of death was enshrined in the darkness. But those that lived turned the more eagerly to pleasure and revelry, desiring ever more goods and more riches; and after the days of Tar-Ancalimon the offering of the first fruits to Eru was neglected, and men went seldom any more to the Hallow upon the heights of Meneltarma in the midst of the land.

The Silmarillion, Akallabêth

Gimilzôr took [Inzilbêth] to wife, though this was little to her liking, for she was in heart one of the Faithful...; but the kings and their sons were grown proud and not to be gainsaid in their wishes. No love was there between Ar-Gimilzôr and his queen, or between their sons. Inziladûn, the elder, was like his mother in mind as in body; but Gimilkhâd, the younger, went with his father, unless he were yet prouder and more wilful. To him Ar-Gimilzôr would have yielded the sceptre rather than to the elder son, if the laws had allowed.

But when Inziladûn acceded to the sceptre, he took again a title in the Elven-tongue as of old, calling himself Tar-Palantir... But his repentance was too late to appease the anger of the Valar with the insolence of his fathers, of which the greater part of his people did not repent.

The Silmarillion, Akallabêth

For Gimilkhâd followed the ways of Ar-Gimilzôr, and became leader of the King's Party, and resisted the will of Tar-Palantir as openly as he dared, and yet more in secret.

Unfinished Tales, Part 2, Ch 3, The Line of Elros, Kings of Númenor

The Númenóreans now make permanent dwellings on the shores of Middle-earth, seeking wealth and dominion; they build many havens and fortresses. The Elf-friends go chiefly to the North-west, but their strongest place is at Pelargir.... The King's Folk establish lordships in Umbar and Harad and in many other places on the coasts of the Great Lands.

The Peoples of Middle-Earth, HoME Vol 12, Part 1, Ch 6, The Tale of Years of the Second Age

The great cape and land-locked firth of Umbar had been Númenórean land since days of old; but it was a stronghold of the King's Men, who were afterwards called the Black Númenóreans, corrupted by Sauron, and who hated above all the followers of Elendil.

The Return of the King, LoTR Appendix A, Annals of the Kings and Rulers: Gondor and the Heirs of Anárion, Footnote